Just playing with our friends.

I feel very blessed to be working with this group of children especially as my first class at the preschool level. They are all so loving and caring and truly do enjoy playing with one another.  We talk a lot about friends and making sure that we use our friends names when we are calling them or playing with them. They really do light up when they hear their name being called by a friend and classmate.  I think it helps foster those friendships even more when they can call them by name.

I always try to capture these special times on camera but I don't always succeed. Here are just a few special interactions from the last month.

Making a dinosaur habitat out of blocks. 

Giving our best dinosaur growl after we completed putting together the dinosaur puzzle that one friends brought in for Show and Share.

The seasaw is always a big hit while we are out on the playground. The even figured out a way to allow more than 2 friends to play at once. I wish you could hear the giggles that come out of their mouths while playing on this piece of equipment. 

This was a "Friendship Ball" they got dressed up to attend. They danced to music and had a great time with many different friends attending. 

 Thank you so much for sharing your children with us.  They are a joy to teach and be with on a daily basis. But I am sure you already knew that. ;-) 

Valentine's Day was filled with fun and friends!

We celebrated Valentines' Day and Friendship for a whole week. The children had so much fun with all the different games we played, art projects we tried and songs we learned that I think they could have continued the theme for the rest of the month.

The children worked hard making their "special" Valentines that they would mail to you.  They each took a turn cutting out their own heart with Ms. Maria and choosing just the right spot on their paper to glue it down. Then came the handprint to add the finishing touch. Some children are still a little unsure  about getting their hands painted but they still were able to make their Valentine just as special.

Once we finished making our Valentines we talked about the mailman and how our valentines would get  to moms and dads as a surprise.  Then it was time to make what some of the children thought was a VERY LONG trek to the mailbox to get them on their journey to you.  The day we mailed our valentines happened to be the cold windy day but we persevered and got our letters to the mailbox. 

To complete our week we had our Valentine's Day Party on Tuesday. The children were dressed so festive and were so excited to share their Valentines with their friends. Each child got a chance to deliver their cards and treats to their friends mailbox. Then we played several heart inspired games and sang several songs. Ask your child about getting bit by the love bug. ;-)  

Love Bug Poem

It starts with a smile and turns into a giggle.

You start to laugh, your legs start to wiggle,

You look around for someone to hug

It looks like you have been bit by

the love bug.

AAAACCHHOOOO!

The children are learning so much and all of them were able to tell me the colors as well as sort their candy hearts into the proper pile. Some even made patterns with their hearts and snuck a few into their tummies.

Finally it was time to enjoy our Valentine's Day treat. We enjoyed yummy cupcakes, strawberries and juice.  Our cupcake baker was very proud of his cupcakes and made sure everyone knew that he was the one in charge of the sprinkles. So cute!!

Thank you so everyone who helped make our Valentine's Day a fun day with friends. We laughed, sang and had a great time. 

Winter Fun

In the month of January we explored winter through all different types of play. We played in shaving cream "snow" which was a lot of fun for everyone. It made our classroom smell great too. Some of the children worked on writing their names whiles others just drew designs and made patterns.

We also played in the sensory table filled with flour "snow". We built snow castles, drove trucks through the snow and even tried to have a little snowball fight getting covered with our "snow"almost daily. :-) 

Some other activities we enjoyed were painting with bubble wrap to look like snow, making polar bears out of shaving cream and spray painting our snowflakes. We were really hoping for some real snow to play in but no luck so far this year. Maybe next.

Hibernation Day

In January we had our hibernation day complete with a bearcave in our classroom.
We wore our PJs to school and snuggled in a bearcave to read stories and talk with
our friends.

The children really enjoyed making waffles as their hibernation snack. The were able to mix their own batter, pour it in to the waffle maker and watch as it cooked into delicious fluffy waffles. 

Hot Chocolate Day was YUMMY!

We had a yummy Hot Chocolate Day today! The children were so excited to bring in their own mugs from home and were so proud to show everyone their mug. We thought the mugs were such a great reflection of their personalties. So cute!

We painted with hot chocolate scented paint and marshmallows. The paint smelled quite chocolately and they even got to eat a marshmallow when they were finished. Not the one they painted with though. ;-)

Finally, it was time to have our hot chocolate with our snack. Everyone got a chance to make their own hot chocolate and add marshmallows to their liking. There was a lot of marshmallow liking. :-) 

Then they all decided they needed straws to drink their hot chocolate so straws all around. 

Hot Chocolate Day was a lot of fun, now we are just waiting for snow to enjoy it again. 

Chapel

Every Tuesday we go to chapel in the morning for about 15 or 20 minutes. We have chapel in the main sanctuary, and we sing songs, and Mrs. Dawn has a lesson that usually reflects the topics we are talking about in our classrooms.  This month we are also using our chapel time to practice for our upcoming Christmas program.

The prayer we sing in chapel every day is "Thank You Jesus" ask your child to sing it to you. Here are the lyrics and the tune is London Bridges.

Thank You Jesus for my church

for my church, for my church

Thank You Jesus for my church

Thank You Jesus!

Repeat but switch my church to "my friends" or "my family" 

Here we are standing on the altar practicing our songs for our Christmas program. For the Christmas program we will be on the left side of the altar if you are looking at it from the pews, so get a good seat as they are excited to sing for you. 

The children really are learning to be good listener and sit in the chapel quietly as they listen to Mrs. Dawn and the lesson she has to share. I am proud at how well they are doing and how much they enjoy sharing and contributing to the group. 

November flew by

We stayed busy throughout the month of November and I can't believe that December is already here. In November we talked about the changing season, especially the leaves and animals that are preparing to hibernate for the winter. We also read books about the Pilgrims and Indians and had our own Thanksgiving Feast.

Here are a few pictures from the fun we had during our fall days in November.

We sponge painted a class leaf to decorate the hallway. The children enjoyed mixing the colors and working together. 

We had all sorts of different nuts the children were able to explore and crack open like squirrels. They were surprised to find out how hard it was to actually open the shells and get the nuts out.  We decided squirrels must have really strong teeth. 

Our fall trees have already come home, but we sure had a great time making them. We by painted the trunks with coffee (boy did the room smell good that day) and then we pounded colored pasta into a million little pieces to make our "fall leaves". I hope you are enjoying them as much as they enjoyed making them. They turned out great. 

One morning when the children arrived at school they saw that our class tree had lost all of it's leaves. They used rakes to collect the leaves, then we jumped in them and used the parachute to make them fall from the sky.

Octoberfest

Our annual Octoberfest was a huge hit. We had a beautiful day and the children had a lot of fun participating in the different activities from the costume parade to the hayride finale.  

Our class was filled with a lot of wonderful costumes. We had a police officer, Buzz Lightyear, Diego, Snow White, Spiderman, a pink ladybug, a red ladybug, a bumblebee, a green dragon and even Mickey Mouse!! 

"Pumpkin" bowling and bean bag toss were two of the games the children were able to play during the Octoberfest. All the children enjoyed being able to get outside and play some fun carnival games with their friends. 

The hayride took us around the church parking lot. The children enjoyed watching the tractor and waving at their friends as they passed the playground.  

Spider muffins were a yummy treat we got to enjoy during our fun week of fall holiday fun. The muffins were not only cute they were quite tasty too and everyone gobbled theirs up, eyeballs and all. 

During our fun with spiders we painted our hands and made spiders with up to 10 eyeballs and 8 "finger" legs. 

Pumpkins were also the focus during our week. We were able to hammer tees into a HUGE pumpkin Ms. Terri brought into the class. We also opened the pumpkin to check out the seeds inside.

 A great time was had by all the children during our fun week of fall festivities. Now on to November and more fall fun. 

All Things Red...Apples & Fire Safety

The last two weeks seemed to have flown by and I am just now getting a chance to update you on all the fun things we have been doing in the classroom. Hopefully you have been hearing about them at home and seeing pictures on here is just a way to revisit our fun learning experiences.

We spent a week learning about apples and all they have to offer. The children already knew so much about different kinds of apples, what to do with the seeds and even what yummy things you can bake with apples. It was amazing.

We did an apple taste test, with Granny Smith being the favorite apple of choice by almost everyone which was a total surprise if you can have seen their puckery faces as they tried this one.

  

We worked on fine motor skills by lacing worms through apples with the corresponding number. Everyone loved the slimy feel of the worms and was able to take a turn lacing,  sorting and making patterns with  all the different colored worms.  

As a cooking experience we went over to the kitchen in the gym building and made apple bundles, which are small individual sized apple pies. The children were able to use an apple peeler, slicer, corer to get the apples ready for our bundles. We even were able to get the peel off one apple in one long string that was long enough for all of us to hold at once. 

After apples we dove into another red topic with our Fire Safety Week October 11-14th. We learned about Firemen being helpers in the community as well as what to do in case of a fire. 

The children really loved role playing as a fireman with the fire truck that we had in our classroom. We sure put out a lot of fires this week. :-) 

We read the book Stop, Drop and Roll and sang a song about what to do if we catch on fire. They brought home their fire on Wednesday and hopefully were able to tell you what we did with it in the classroom. :-)

We also painted "fire" using yellow and orange paint. We used a plastic wrap technique that kept everyone's hands clean and made for some pretty happy painters. 

With the rainy weather we played in the gym building instead of the playground. The children had a great time, bouncing on the hoppy balls, building blocks, throwing balls and just running and having fun. 

We had a great week! Hopefully on Tuesday we will have a visit from the real firemen and firetruck and the children can WOW them with all they have learned and know about fire safety.